Originally Posted by
ladiesman217
*goes back in time and ensures religion never saw the light of day*
*returns to present time to find a world of joy, bliss, beauty and peace, with scientific knowledge and technology eons ahead of what currently exists*
Return to present day to find things much the same, unless LDM217 altered human DNA on his day trip to the past.
Humans are group animals designed to cooperate and part o that is believing group myths and respecting or at least following one or other leader. The Israelites brought people out of Egypt and married foreign women. When times got tough in forty years of desert wandering, these people wanted to revert to their old gods. Group coherence meant adherence to and enforcement of the Abhramic God. The old testament is about nation buildin an political power as much as it is about religion.
Much of the New Testament is about the inheritors of the culture forged in Old Testament times, interacting with and resisting the power of Rome, their coloniser and master.
People nowadays often say, '' I'm not religious but I'm spiritual '' - - same difference.
The impulse that leads to religion and to people seeking or thinking they have found a messiah is the same impulse that led Germans en masse, to adore Hitler or for adoring concertgoers to worship their idols on stage.
Religion by its tendency to unify, has played its part in producing our modern world.
The basic tenets of most religions are good but like any other human endeavour, can be hijacked by false prophets and power hungry megalomaniacs.
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Shalom/salaam.
10,000 years of Middle Eastern civilisation and the place is not at peace but rather in pieces.